


Ajar

by EmeraldTulip



Series: deadbolt [2]
Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: Future Fic, Gen, M/M, Near Future, Or Is It?, Possession, Post-Canon, Post-Graduation, Post-Possession, Prompt Fill, Step-Siblings Will Byers & Eleven | Jane Hopper, Unreliable Narrator, Will Byers Has Powers, broken tropes, let will byers have a good day please and thank you, or does he?, season 3 is irrelevant they dont move away okay, the italics are important this time im not just annoying, too easy of an ending but yknow what
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-29
Updated: 2020-03-29
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:48:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,170
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23384770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/EmeraldTulip/pseuds/EmeraldTulip
Summary: It's been weeks since Will emerged from the lab with a clean bill of health. He's happy and calm, his shadowy powers are gone, and he just wants to focus on starting college.But Will likes art. Will recognizes who his friends are. Will knows his own birthday.ThisWill isn't anything like that. But El got rid of the shadow possessing Will's mind. Right?
Relationships: Eleven | Jane Hopper & Maxine "Max" Mayfield, Jonathan Byers & Joyce Byers & Will Byers & Eleven | Jane Hopper & Jim "Chief" Hopper, Shadow Monster | Mind Flayer & Everyone, Will Byers & Eleven | Jane & Dustin Henderson & Maxine Mayfield & Lucas Sinclair & Mike Wheeler, Will Byers & Eleven | Jane Hopper, Will Byers & Shadow Monster | Mind Flayer, Will Byers/Mike Wheeler
Series: deadbolt [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1681942
Comments: 9
Kudos: 82





	Ajar

**Author's Note:**

  * For [the_chaotic_lesbian](https://archiveofourown.org/users/the_chaotic_lesbian/gifts).



> this is indeed a sequel to something i wrote two years ago lol  
> kasey [@kaseythespaceacelesbian](https://kaseythespaceacelesbian.tumblr.com) won my 1k gift on tumblr, which was a fic of choice, so this is the idea we discussed!  
> it isn't 100% necessary to read the first part to understand whats going on, but i do make some references to events that happened. so read that if you want.  
> enjoy, everyone!

His name is Will Byers. He is eighteen years old. He is home, and he is safe.

El greets him at the door with a violent shove, pushing Mike back as she takes Will’s face in her hands. He can feel her power pulsating through her fingers, against his neck, as she presses their foreheads together.

“El, what the hell?” Mike demands, but El has already let Will go. He stumbles back a little.

“Echoes,” she says. “Of someone else. But nothing I can see.” Her eyes are slightly narrowed, and her scrutiny makes Will’s heart beat a little faster.

“So I’m good, then?” he asks, absently holding out a hand for Mike to take—he does, of course.

El glances at their joined hands, then back to his face. She has to tilt her head to look up at him. “Yeah. You’re good.”

* * *

“Dr. Owens called,” Joyce says during breakfast. The house is quiet, people still sleeping behind closed doors.

“No,” he says immediately, a little too loud. “No, I don’t want to go back again. It’s been a week, I feel fine!”

She grins bemusedly at him. “I already told him that.” She twirls her fork around. “Besides, you’re off to college soon, you need to spend time with us before you go.”

“Us?” he asks, and she raises an eyebrow.

“Your brother, your sister, Hop… ringing any bells?” She waits for his response with her hand held up, three fingers raised.

He laughs. “I thought you might have acquired more humans to squeeze into this house.”

She collects both of their plates, ruffling his hair as she passes. “Don’t get smart on me now, Will the Wise.”

* * *

He takes down the posters in his room, ignoring the headache that grows in the meantime. If anyone asks, he’ll pass it off as packing for college, but in reality, he doesn’t want to stare at them any more than he has to. He idly flips through a few of his old sketchbooks after digging them out from his desk, letting out a huff when he sees a page almost entirely blacked out. He doesn’t know what all these drawings mean—the ones of Mike are obvious, but some are much more cryptic.

 _The Void_ , Will thinks, and then the gaping darkness suddenly makes sense; remnants of the last six years.

“Hey,” El says awkwardly, hovering right outside the door frame, and Will turns.

“Hi,” he answers. “You okay?”

She nods. “Just… my walkman broke, I’m looking for batteries. Have you seen any?”

“Nope,” he says, popping the p. “I’ll let you know if I do, though.”

“Cool, thanks, Will.” She flashes a small smile that doesn’t quite meet her eyes before darting off down the hall.

That girl is weirder than most. He knows why, of course, but it’s still sometimes funny.

* * *

It’s family dinner night, which means Hop has to be home from work before seven o’clock, Jonathan is forbidden from leaving to go to the Wheeler’s, and Will and El aren’t allowed to barricade themselves in their rooms. He supposes it makes sense: Jonathan will be back to college soon, and this time, Will and El are leaving as well. Hopper and Joyce will just have to suffer through their cooking by themselves.

Hopper is in the middle of talking through an old case when Will remembers his earlier conversation with El.

“Oh, hey, I found you some batteries for your walkman,” he says, pulling them from his pocket.

El doesn’t take them, just looks at him, the hand holding her fork frozen above her plate. Jonathan frowns, too.

“What?” Will asks, because the abrupt switch in mood is unnerving. “What is it?”

Jonathan offers, “I thought she—”

“I don’t have a walkman,” El cuts him off.

“You said you were looking for batteries for it earlier,” Will posits, now totally lost.

El sets down her fork, her jaw clenching very slightly. “I need batteries for my radio. Even if I said walkman, you know I don’t have one.”

“Okay?” He doesn’t get it. “I don’t know what’s going on anymore, just don’t call me a liar. Take your damn batteries.” He tosses them across the table, careless, and El catches them neatly in her hand.

“Right.” She takes a long sip from her glass and then wipes her mouth with her napkin. “May I be excused?”

“Of course, sweetheart,” Joyce says, and El is out of her chair instantly, the legs scraping against the floor.

“Goodnight,” she says stiffly, turning and walking away.

Like he said. She’s really weird.

It takes him a moment to realize that the rest of them are staring at him. “Oh, _what_?” he sighs, dropping his utensils. He clearly won’t have time to use them tonight.

“Will.” Jonathan’s voice is gently chastising, and it’s infuriating. “What’s up with you? It’s _El_.”

“I _know_.” He props his chin up on his hand. “And?”

“Your attitude toward your sister is horrible,” Hopper accuses, and at least _his_ voice is commanding. “She barely said anything, and you threw batteries at her!”

“She’s not my sister, and you’re not my dad!” he seethes, slamming his palms down on the table, and the overhead light wobbles from the force. He folds his fingers into fists, willing the anger to lower to a simmer. “Just leave me alone.”

“Will,” Joyce says as he stands up. “Honey—”

“I’m going to Mike’s,” he mutters as he shoves his chair away, forcing his socked feet into shoes and tugging his jacket down from the rack. “Don’t wait up.”

“Will!” Joyce’s shout is cut off by the door closing behind him.

He breathes in the evening air, casting a glance up—no clouds, just stars. They don’t get nights like these in the Upside Down. It’s nice to breathe air that doesn’t burn his lungs; it’s nice to lean into the wind that brushes his skin. Sometimes it feels like this is the only place he doesn’t have to perform in—right out in the middle of the street.

“Don’t go to Mike.”

He jumps, his heart skipping, and he whirls around. El is sitting on the curb a few feet away.

 _She knows,_ Will thinks. _She wants to help me_.

“Why?” he asks, watching the wind blow her hair across her face.

El sighs, a sound that gets swept up into the air, and looks over. Her eyes freeze him in place, green-brown. “I don’t know,” she says, and she sounds honest. “But this isn’t right.”

 _She knows_.

“You don’t know anything,” he snaps. “You don’t get it.”

“Maybe.” She shrugs, turning her eyes to the gutter beneath her feet. “I don’t get a lot of things.” She doesn’t look at him again, but he sees the flash of light that reflects across her pupils. “Just don’t hurt him.”

He scoffs. “Why would I hurt Mike?”

She doesn’t answer, so he turns and makes his way to the cul-de-sac.

 _She didn’t mean Mike_ , Will thinks, and as soon as he turns a corner he groans, sagging into the wall as pain shoots through his body.

* * *

“Hey,” Mike smiles, easing the window open. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” he sighs, slipping into Mike’s bedroom. “Family dinner didn’t go so well.”

Mike frowns, slipping his hand into Will’s and tugging him further inside the room. “Shit, what happened?”

He doesn’t want to talk about it. “Just Hopper trying to be all fatherly, and El is annoying the hell out of me.”

Mike tilts his head. “I thought you liked having the chief around.”

Will’s shoulders slump, a half-shrug. “It’s alright, I guess. But he always looks to El before me, trusts her over me… and she’s the one acting weird.”

“It’s _El_ ,” Mike says, and he sounds almost exactly like Jonathan. “You’re used to her.”

“She tried to stop me from coming here,” he explains. “She got mad at me, I told her I was leaving, and she told me not to. She said it _wasn’t right_ , told me _don’t hurt him_.”

He doesn’t meet Mike’s gaze, but he can feel the sudden rigidity in his posture. “That’s… that’s such bullshit. That doesn’t sound like El at all, where did she get that from?”

Will cracks a small grin, pulling away from Mike to flop onto his bed. “I think Indiana made my sister homophobic.”

It gets a laugh out of Mike, even if it isn’t that funny. It also earns him a kiss, so he won’t complain.

* * *

His name is Will Byers. He is eighteen years old. He is home, but he is not safe.

El doesn’t know exactly what’s happening, he concludes. But she knows that something’s up. That much is clear from the sudden uptick in unbroken stares he receives from her, unbothered even when the sun slants through the window and lights her eyes up golden.

“I don’t want to talk about my brother,” he hears her saying into her radio one night, on the other side of the wall that separates their bedrooms.

Max responds, clearly perplexed. _“But if you said—”_

“I know what I said,” El snaps. “But _I_ am Will’s sister. I will figure this out myself.”

* * *

“Hey, Lucas,” Will smiles as he approaches, and Lucas looks up from the record in his hands.

“Oh, hey, Will!” he greets. “What’re you doing here?”

Will’s smile turns confused. “I’m… buying a record. It’s a music store. Are you not here for music?”

“Nah, I’m with Max today,” Lucas jabs a thumb over his shoulder.

Will cranes his neck and sees a familiar mop of red hair at the register. “I thought she doesn’t work on Wednesdays.”

“She picked up a shift last-minute,” Lucas shrugs. “Oh! She gets off at four, do you want to go to the movies with us?”

Will makes a face. “Won’t I be third-wheeling?”

“Dustin couldn’t make it, but El’s coming, too,” Lucas says. “Didn’t you know that?”

“I didn’t, actually.” Will’s teeth grind for a moment before he steadies himself. “Sure, I’ll go.”

“Great!” Lucas claps his shoulder. “I’ll let you get your record, then, I’ll run out for some snacks to sneak in. Be back soon!” He practically zooms out the door, the cheerful ring of the bell announcing his leave.

Will hovers, his hand on a particular record, until the customer at the register leaves—the only other customer. Just the cashier left. “Max.”

Her eyes brighten when she sees him. “Hi, Will! Didn’t expect to see you today, what’s up?”

He slides the record across the counter. “One, I’d like to buy this. Two, is it okay if I ask you a question?”

Max frowns at the record. “Mozart? Not really your speed, Byers. Didn’t even know we carried classical.”

“For my mom,” he waves it off. “So… that question?”

“Right. Shoot.”

“I’m worried about El,” he says, and instantly he sees the shields go up. “She just hasn’t been herself lately, and you’re her best friend, so I was wondering if you knew what was happening.”

Max bites her lip. “I… don’t know how much I can tell you, Will,” she says. “Both because I don’t want to betray her trust and all that, but also because I don’t really know.” She puts the record in a bag. “She’s been kinda cagey ever since the lab stopped your demon dreams. First I thought it was Mike, but she said she really is over him and I believe her. Then I thought it might be that she saw into your mind when all that pseudo-possession stuff was going on and maybe that shook her up, but…” She shakes her head. “She hasn’t gotten any better, and… I don’t know, she’s just always _thinking_.”

“She doesn’t trust me,” he says. “I think she’s still scared that something might happen.”

Max hesitates, her index finger picking at a splinter on the wood of the counter. “Will it?” she asks. “Will something happen?”

 _I hope so,_ Will thinks.

“Not if I can help it,” he says.

* * *

El stops in her tracks when she sees him outside of the theater with Lucas and Max.

“Hey,” he waves, nudging Max.

“El!” she cheers happily, whisking El up in a hug. “You made it!”

El looks vaguely bemused. “It’s summer. I wasn’t doing anything else.”

“We’re trying to commend you, here,” Lucas chastises, materializing back behind Max with tickets in hand. “Pretend you were saving the world.”

Max snickers, and El lets an uneasy grin spread across her face. Will’s eyes track the look she gives Max. “Here, c’mere,” Max mutters, and she takes El by the hand and pulls her a little ways down the street, murmuring into her ear.

Lucas gives him a look. “Girls,” he says, but anything else he may have added is cut off by El’s angry shout.

“I told you!” she insists, and her fists are clenched at her sides. “I _told_ you. I have a bad feeling. Something went wrong, I _know_ it.”

He shoots Lucas a hesitant look before heading over to the girls. “El,” he says, reaching out, “what are you—”

“ _Stop_ ,” El bites out, and the crushing anger in her tone does stop him in his tracks. “Don’t touch me.”

Max tries to calm her down, grasping her hands, and El lets her. “El, hey, can you just _explain_ what you mean?”

“No!” El yells. “It doesn’t make sense, at all, and all I know is that something is _wrong_ and I need him _away from me_.”

“What the fuck, El,” Lucas says, though he hasn’t moved. “He’s trying to help, he’s your _brother_ —”

El laughs, derisive and cold. “He is _not_ my brother.” She wrenches her hands from Max’s grip and storms off, leaving the rest of them to stare after her.

* * *

His name is Will Byers. He is eighteen years old. He is not home, and he is not safe.

His bedroom is unfamiliar, the walls bare of posters and the desk washed clean of ink. Mike’s wide eyes won’t stop wandering the room when he comes over, so Will doesn’t let him in anymore. El is absolutely frigid, and it seems to be rubbing off on Hopper. Even Joyce is getting a little skittish; Jonathan is the only one acting normal.

He can’t be in the house for long anymore.

* * *

“Hi. You’re acting weird, Jonathan said so,” Nancy states when she opens the door, and Mike hits her.

So much for Jonathan acting normal. He's apparently a good actor.

“Shut the fuck up!” he says, ushering Will inside. “What the hell is wrong with you, Nance?”

Nancy doesn’t look at Mike, just fixes her eyes on Will. “I’m not sure,” she admits. “But he is.” She stalks off, frowning thoughtfully, and the sideroom door slams shut.

“I’m sorry,” Mike apologizes for her. “Everyone is just being… well, weird. I don’t know."

“Everybody?” Will asks, as if he doesn't already know.

Mike shrugs, pulling Will up the stairs by the hand. “Dustin keeps radioing me wanting to talk about…” He shakes his head. “It doesn’t matter. El’s just freaking everyone out.”

“Yeah.”

Mike closes his bedroom door behind them, taking both of Will’s hands in his. “Are things okay with you and El? I haven’t really seen her since that argument Lucas told me about.”

“She’s—” He cuts himself off. “She said I wasn’t her brother and ran away. I’ve kinda been avoiding her after that.”

“Oh.” Mike’s grip tightens, just a little. “I—I’m sorry, that sucks.”

Will offers a small grin. “It’s okay.” He tugs Mike closer, wrapping his arms around him, and Mike returns the embrace. “Is it alright if I stay here for a while?”

“Yes,” Mike replies instantly, before pulling away and flushing. “I mean, yeah, of course. Do you want me to drive you to your place to pick up some stuff?”

* * *

He tells Mike to wait in the car while he slips quietly through the front door, darting down the hallways and shoving necessities into his bag. Clothes, mostly; Mike’s, also mostly. He grabs his spare toiletries and his radio, debating the latter for a moment before tossing it down onto his bed.

The posters are all gone from the walls, the bookshelves cleaned out, and with this added packing-up spree, the room almost seems empty. He glances at the sketchbook laying open on the desk—an old sketch of El, her hair slicked back and her suit jacket ruffled.

He leaves it, hoisting his bag over his shoulder and easing his bedroom door closed behind him, making no sound as he creeps out of the house.

“You don’t understand,” he hears, and he stops in his tracks on the porch. Mike is out of the car, facing away—facing El.

“What don’t I understand El?” Mike demands, and despite how much he towers over her, she doesn’t flinch.

“He’s not the same,” El says, and though she’s trying to sound factual she’s clearly fighting back tears. “And it’s not—I don’t want to say what I think it is.”

Mike scoffs. “You think he’s still got the shadow monster in him, don’t you? You don’t think I know my own boyfriend? Which, yeah, by the way, he’s _my boyfriend_ so don’t be an asshole about it.”

El finally looks surprised. “I wasn’t—I know he’s your boyfriend. Who told you I wasn’t okay with it?” Mike doesn’t answer, and then realization dawns on El’s face. “Ah. Will.” She rubs a hand down her face. “Mike… I believe you know Will. Probably better than any of us. But you care about him, and that blinds you.”

“I thought you cared about him, too,” Mike bites out, his fists clenching at his sides.

“I did,” El says softly. “I still do. But I’ve seen this before. Felt this before. It doesn’t feel like Will anymore.”

“Bullshit,” he spits out, finally unfreezing from his spot on the porch, and Mike and El whirl around. “That’s such bullshit, El. Just admit that you don’t know me as well as you thought you did. I’m me.”

El’s expression has gone stoney, her arms crossed. “It’s not about _us_. It’s about Will.”

_I’m Will. Listen, I’m Will._

“I _am_ Will,” he snaps, and he pulls on Mike’s sleeve. “Get me out of here.”

Mike falters, spitting out words that don’t lead anywhere, but he falls back into the driver’s seat and turns the key.

“Mike,” El says through the open window, her face white. “Mike—”

With a roar of the engine, the Wheeler car pulls out onto the road.

* * *

Mike is frighteningly silent for the next few hours. He says nothing at the dining table—Nancy doesn’t speak at all, either, it’s just Holly and Will and Mike’s parents. And when they go upstairs, Mike cleans the books off of his desk almost robotically.

“Are you okay?” Will sits down on Mike’s bed. “I feel like what El said threw you.”

_Don't hurt him._

“Yeah,” Mike finally mutters, and he strains to hear over the shuffle of papers. “Yeah, it did.”

“I think she’s just used to having something dangerous happen every year,” he offers slowly. “She’s just paranoid.”

“Yeah.” Mike smiles weakly. “Yeah, I know.” He slowly continues the process of clearing his desk, and Will sits awkwardly. “Did you, uh. Where’s your sleeping bag?”

“Shit,” he mutters, glancing at his bag. “I must have left it.”

“You can’t just sleep on the floor,” Mike says, placing his pencils one by one into the cup. “I’ll get sheets for the top bunk.”

Will glances up at the underside of the bunk, but he doesn’t say anything. Mike doesn’t either.

* * *

He stares at the plastic stars stuck on the ceiling, and he doesn’t startle when Mike’s alarm clock lets out one small beep to mark the hour. He rolls over to stare down at the 12:00 blinking at him, bright red.

He does startle when Mike’s sleep-heavy voice mumbles something.

“What?” he whispers. He had thought Mike was asleep.

“Happy birthday, Will,” Mike says, a little clearer this time, and then he shuffles. His face is pressed into his pillow when he says goodnight.

“Thanks.”

The room feels like it’s holding its breath.

* * *

“I believe you,” Mike says, his voice low and breaking, and Will freezes right outside the door, balancing waffles. “I told him happy birthday. He said thanks.”

El’s voice crackles out from Mike’s radio. _“His birthday is in March. It’s August.”_

“Yeah.” Mike sounds miserable. “I’ll… I’ll talk to you later.”

He clenches the plate of waffles so hard it cracks.

* * *

His name is Will Byers. He is not eighteen years old. He is not home, and he is not safe.

He sits alone in Mike’s room, eating Mike’s share of the waffles. Mike is apparently long gone, leaving his untouched breakfast behind him with a promise to “be back soon.” He’d asked where and got no response.

He’s gathered that they think the exorcism experiment didn’t work. Which is dumb, because it did work—a little bit wrong, for sure, but it still worked. He can only sit and imagine fretfully what El could be telling Mike. _Plotting_ with Mike.

Because he likes Mike. He _really_ likes Mike. After all the shit he’s gone through, Mike is the one that makes him feel human. The Upside Down is far behind him, he can’t use his dark powers anymore—he’s normal. El seems to think that Will being normal is wrong.

No matter what stupid lie Mike made up about Will’s birthday, he feels a thousand years old.

* * *

“Where were you?” he asks, watching the ground move as Mike drives down the street.

“I was with Lucas.” No mention of El.

“Is that the truth?” he prods, and Mike twitches.

“ _Yeah_.” He looks annoyed now. Fuck. “Why do you need to ask me that?”

He struggles for words for a second, finally looking away from the window. “I just—I thought maybe you went to see El, since you seemed to want to listen to her yesterday.”

“Christ,” Mike sighs. “She wasn’t wrong, you’ve been weird. I just… I care about you so much, Will.”

“I care about you, too,” he replies, itching to take one of Mike’s hands, but both are on the steering wheel. “I’m just adjusting, okay? After all this shit I’ve gone through with the Upside Down, and the lab, and all that. College is soon and it’s all changing, can you blame me for being a little fucked up? It messed with my mind, dude.”

“I know,” Mike says, and his mouth is pressed into a line.

* * *

“This is my house,” he notices, and Mike glances at him as they pull into the driveway. “I don’t want to be here, Mike, I thought—”

“Can you just—” Mike cuts himself off with a sigh. “Can you just come in with me?”

“I don’t—”

“For me,” Mike says, and his voice has the broken edge to it again. “Please?”

So he does.

The moment he walks in he wants to leave, but Mike is behind him, blocking the door.

“Honey,” Joyce says, and her voice is wavery. “Honey, I know this is scary. But El just wants to check, and if you’re—if you’re Will, then you’ll do it.”

El is standing in the corner, flanked on each side by Lucas and Max. “There’s no way out,” she says quietly. “Dustin and Hop and the rest of them are securing the house. Just let me.”

“I don’t want you in my _brain_ again,” he snipes. “It sucked last time, and you’re convinced that I’m lying, anyway. So what’s the point?”

“It’s not _you_ , Will is—”

“Hey,” Mike cuts her off, grabbing Will’s shoulders and turning him around to look him in the eyes. “Hey, Will, I’m not going to let her hurt you. She just wants to help. She just wants her brother.”

“She said herself that that’s not me,” he scoffs.

Mike looks sad—more sad than he’s ever seen. “Because that’s Will,” he says. “And you're right, that’s not you.”

He wrenches himself out of Mike’s grip and turns to say something, to yell, to fight El. He doesn’t get to do any of those things, because El’s hands are on Will’s face and everything goes foggy.

 _It was a distraction,_ Will thinks, and then the fog drowns everything.

* * *

His name is not Will Byers. He is not eighteen years old. He is not home, and he is not safe.

“You _motherfucker_.”

Pain explodes through his jaw, and he stumbles to the ground, blinking his eyes into focus.

Will Byers is standing there, the knuckles of his fist red.

“Wait,” he croaks, holding out a hand. “Just wait.”

“That’s funny,” Will says. “You stole _months_ of my life! It was _mine_ , not yours!”

He tastes copper in his mouth and spits blood onto the forest floor. It isn't real—in the sense that it isn't physically happening—but it sure feels like it. “I’ve been a shadow for longer than I can possibly know,” he snaps. “A few months is nothing.”

“You _used_ me,” Will retorts. “I saw it all. You hurt my family, and my friends, and they thought it was me.”

“I hurt no one!” he hisses. “You were the _only_ chance I had to escape the void. Why would I ruin that?”

Will narrows his eyes. “Well, you did. You messed with my sister. You messed with Mike. You’re a monster.”

He shrugs. “I suppose. But so are you.” If there’s one good thing about the void, it’s that he can feel his face healing already. “If it wasn’t for me in your body, all that shadow magic would be uncontrollable. I used it to keep your brain intact. You’re a human, and humans aren’t meant to have that power. If you get your body back, you risk _actually_ hurting someone with the shadows. You already have, after all.”

“I can handle it, I _had_ been handling it!" Will insists. " _You_ told me to hurt Troy!”

“It was still you.”

“This is pointless,” Will says. “I don’t understand why… why you stole my life and why I can’t just have it back.”

He shrugs. “I think you can,” he admits. “Your sister is working on bringing you back. But really? You don’t know why I did it?”

“Other than the fact that you hate me, no.”

“You’ve seen the Upside Down,” he says. “That’s my home. Can you blame me for wanting to be human?”

Will’s face is suddenly a mix of anger and pity. “Your home sucks. But you’ll never be human.” He tilts his head, as if he hears something, and he looks back. “If you wanted to be human, you should have learned to behave like one, too. It’s a lot more fun than being spiteful.”

“That’s some Plato bullshit—”

He blinks, and Will is gone.

* * *

His name is Will Byers. He is eighteen years old. He is home, and he is safe.

The first thing he sees are El’s eyes—brown-green, colors swallowed up by the darkness. The sharpness returns behind her gaze as he regains his bearings, and then she lets go of his face.

She blinks, her mouth curving into a smile. “Will.”

“You found me,” he says, and his tongue feels a little strange in his mouth—he hasn’t used his own body in a while, after all. “I thought maybe you never would.”

El drags him into a hug. “You’re my brother. Of course I found you.” She steps back and Mike steps forward, and Will’s vision tunnels.

“I’m sorry it took me so long,” Mike says, and the gold seems even brighter than usual in his brown eyes. “I just… wanted you to be okay. More than anything, I wanted everything to be okay. I was dumb.”

“It _is_ okay,” Will breathes, and Mike’s tentative smile makes him do something incredibly stupid—he kisses him right then and there.

He hears three people groan in annoyance and fake-gag—El, Max, and Lucas, no doubt—but he doesn’t care, because it’s sickening to think that the monster was doing this to Mike the whole time. He didn’t deserve that, and Will is going to do everything he possibly can to make sure that Mike doesn’t remember kissing a hollow shell of who Will really is.

“I missed you,” Mike whispers as he pulls back. “I didn’t even realize you were gone, but I missed you so much. The whole time.”

Will smiles. “It’s okay.” His mother steps into view and he instantly feels his face redden—he hadn’t noticed her in her corner. “Oh, uh. Sorry, Mom.”

She gets on her tiptoes and kisses his forehead. “I love you so much, sweetheart.” She hugs him so tightly it almost hurts, and for some reason, Will suddenly has a question.

“The monster didn’t fuck up my CalArts stuff, right?” he asks, alarmed. “I’m still going to college?”

He must sound ridiculous—fresh out of a possession and already worrying about school. Lucas starts laughing.

* * *

“Ready?” Mike asks, and Max claps nervously in the passenger’s seat.

“Take us away.”

Will stares back at the house as they hit the road, even when it’s too far away to actually see. His hand is still raised from when he waved to his mom, and Hop, and Dustin and Lucas and Jonathan. Jonathan is driving back to New York with Nancy tomorrow, and this time, they’re taking Dustin with them. Lucas is getting on a plane to Washington next week.

El takes his free hand and gently tugs him down into his seat. “I’m with you,” she says lowly. “I’m always with you.”

Mike and Max bicker over the radio and Will lets himself laugh, squeezing El’s fingers as he does.

 _You are now leaving Hawkins,_ the sign says. _Come again soon!_

“Let Max pick,” he says, and Mike gives a squawk of protest and betrayal, reluctantly moving his hand away from the dash.

“You’re whipped,” El teases him as Max laughs, and he sticks his tongue out at her before winking at Will.

“Maybe I am,” he says, and despite all of Max’s stories, Will thinks the California sun won’t be able to match the warmth he feels right now.

* * *

His name is nothing. He is far too old to know. He is home, and he hates it.

Eleven really did sever any connection that might have remained between him and Will. As he melts into the trees, he contemplates his options, of which there are only two: stay here or find some other poor soul lost in the darkness. He needs a less vibrant host.

There are no mirrors in the Upside Down—he doesn’t know what he looks like anymore. He hopes he still looks like Will.

* * *

His name is Will Byers. He is eighteen years old. He is leaving home, and for the first time in a long time, he is truly safe.

**Author's Note:**

> Reviews are, as always, appreciated.
> 
> find me on tumblr, my main is [@perseusjaxon](https://perseusjaxon.tumblr.com) and my writing blog is [@lowriting](https://lowriting.tumblr.com)!


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